Death in Time

by Robyn Nyx

  “One drink is too much for you to cope with the science of what’s happening.”

  Wood scraped on concrete and something was brought down hard on the table Brooke had bugged. Shit. She pulled the headphones away from her right ear and rubbed it to make the pain go away.

  “Just explain what I need to know, and I’ll concentrate really, really hard.”

  Delaney laughed. “We have to find Jenkin and Elena in this time. I’m sure Donovan is long gone. She was hurt, and she had no allies. It would’ve been suicide for her to take us on.”

  “Going home isn’t an option then? Aren’t we just…fucked? Even if we live until 2076, we’ll be old and pretty much fucking useless.”

  “Christ, we’ll only be in our fifties. But no, you’re thinking too literally. Elena’s regen tech rewinds the time we lose in missions. Once she invents that in the sixties, we set it to rewind us ten years, and we just keep using it to go back to our favorite version of ourselves.”

  Time travel and forever young? Sign me up now.

  “If it can go back that far, why haven’t Jenkin and Elena used it to keep themselves young?”

  “I don’t know the answer to that. Maybe they will when they get too old to do work or think…I don’t give a shit why they’re not using it. That’s how we’re going to use it.”

  There was a pause that seemed to go on forever. “Come on, ladies. Talk to me.”

  “What about Sledge? What do you think happened?”

  More silence. From her vantage point, Brooke couldn’t see what they were doing. She figured the pauses were long drinks of whatever hard liquor they’d got. Both of them were close to being alcoholics.

  “I’m unreasonably pissed off about that.”

  Brooke shifted in her chair uncomfortably. She didn’t want to be on the end of Delaney’s ire, not in person, at least. And the thought of what Simson might like to do to appease Delaney’s rage wasn’t something she wanted to focus on.

  “Donovan is a smooth son of a bitch. You think she talked her way out of those ropes? There’s no way she released herself.”

  “I’ve got an unpleasant hunch Sledge was DEA or FBI. I think we got played.”

  Damn. Maybe I got out just in time.

  “Get the fuck out of here. What makes you think that?”

  “She was way too intelligent to be a merc for the Cagle Gang. Now that I’ve had a little time to think about it, things started to seem a little off when we went to see where Muniz was being held. She was just too perfect. I could see her being a big part of our plans moving forward. She said all the right things.”

  “Shame you didn’t figure it out before we left her alone with Donovan.”

  Brooke heard the flat, packing sound of bone against flesh.

  “Shit, Delaney. Sensitive much?”

  “Then don’t fucking state the obvious.”

  Brooke laughed. She would’ve liked to have seen Delaney knock some piss and vinegar out of Simson.

  “I fucked up. I don’t need you ramming it down my throat.”

  “I’m sorry. It was an asshole thing to say.”

  Brooke noticed the way Simson’s voice softened in a way she’d never heard before. It made her think that their partnership might mean something more to Simson.

  The silences were impossible to interpret. I should’ve installed cameras.

  “Where’s our big road trip tomorrow then? Do you know where they are?”

  “I know where Elena is, which means Jenkin won’t be far away. Muniz is our insurance policy. I want you to make him a jacket with the C4 you’ve got left.”

  “What kind of detonator? Remote, I hope.”

  “Remote and a body trigger. No matter what happens, we can’t let Jenkin get her hands on Muniz.”

  Suicide? Brooke leaned back in her chair. She’d overheard Delaney discussing some of their past missions with Simson and the things they’d done. Delaney would have to be a bona fide psychopath to endure without any residual effects. It didn’t take the imagination of a genius to connect the dots from vaguely sane soldier to batshit-bananas mutineer. She remembered Donovan trying to talk her back, and she might’ve succeeded if Simson hadn’t interrupted.

  “Fuck, Delaney. We’re going all in?”

  “We are. Unless we succeed in securing Jenkin and Elena, our future is fucked, and Donovan will come back to retrieve us anyway.”

  “And we’re back to the problem that everything we do from now might be a fat-ass waste of time.”

  “And it could just as easily be our ticket to taking control of Pulsus. If it pays off, Donovan won’t be coming back because she’ll be under our control…or maybe we won’t even recruit her in the first place.”

  “I like the sound of that.”

  Brooke put her hands behind her neck and stretched. Donovan was maybe twenty years in the future and she needed Brooke’s help, though she probably didn’t know it. Brooke was the only one who could stop Delaney from getting to Jenkin and Elena. At least the odds had been halved with Walker and Miller ducking out. She looked at her gun, steadied the racing beat of her heart, and took some deep breaths. She’d prepared for this and always known it would come. So far, she’d been lucky and never had to kill anyone. She hoped that wouldn’t have to change now.

  Chapter Eight

  June 27, 2076—San Francisco

  Despite her mom saying she’d spoken to Jade on a regular basis since Landry had left for her mission, she still wanted to be sure Kondo was nowhere around. Jade had to be safe, and until Jenkin tracked him down, Landry couldn’t relax. She was her number one priority. Going back to finish her mission was a not-too-distant second, but there were some things she needed to deal with here while her body returned to its equilibrium for the next jump.

  Before she’d left the island, Landry had called Jade again to rearrange their meeting. Takeout at her place was preferable to going home and facing the girls at the restaurant. She didn’t want to face Lizbeth just yet, not until she had the full update from Jade on Priscilla. Being close to death had given Landry the unwanted opportunity to evaluate her life and priorities, and figuring that out was going to take some time. Delaney had exploited the new vulnerability of her feelings for Jade, and it had left Landry considering that she might be a liability to missions and to Pulsus. Weakness was something Landry simply wasn’t familiar with.

  Jade stood on the front step and the light flooded behind her, giving her a seraphic silhouette. Landry had never been one for clichés, but Jade really did take her breath away. Her heart didn’t race, rather it missed beats like it forgot what it was supposed to do. She got out of her car and swung its heavy door closed. Jade ran out to her and jumped into Landry’s arms. Her weight felt good and made her presence real. The smell of her hair, the softness of her skin against Landry’s as they kissed, made Landry grip her tighter. Letting her go again was something Landry didn’t want to contemplate yet.

  Jade pulled away slightly. “Coming inside for your proper hero’s welcome?”

  Landry smiled. The mission was a bust; she’d been captured and someone else had to release her; and her best friend had gone rogue. She didn’t feel too heroic, but she was desperate for them to reconnect. We can talk later. “I’d love to.”

  She followed Jade upstairs to her bedroom, their hands never losing touch. Jade turned and pulled Landry close.

  “I was never supposed to miss you this much,” she whispered as she pulled Landry’s T-shirt over her head and tossed it to the floor.

  “Exactly how much have you missed me?” Landry slipped her hand around the back of Jade’s neck and pulled her into a deep kiss. She’d missed her taste, her presence, her energy.

  Jade quickly relieved Landry of her jeans and shorts. “I’m going to show you.”

  Landry sank to the bed and took Jade in her arms as she stood before her. She lifted her T-shirt and kissed her olive skin. Landry smiled as Jade pulled it off and revealed her bare breasts. “
Damn, woman, you’re so fucking sexy.”

  Jade smiled and bit at the corner of her lip, almost shyly. “All for you, baby.”

  “Lucky me.” Jade quickly undressed and joined Landry on the bed, straddling her stomach. Landry tilted her head and closed her eyes as she felt Jade’s heat and wetness. God, I’ve missed this. She reached up and gently squeezed Jade’s nipples, enjoying her soft moans in response. Jade bent down, and her hair felt like the finest silk caressing Landry’s chest as they kissed.

  Landry took her time exploring the curves of Jade’s body, tracing her fingers over Jade’s skin and memorizing her contours as if it were the first and last time she’d touch her. Despite their separation, Landry felt no urgency. There was no need for her to take control, as she usually did. Receiving Jade’s sexual attention was so welcome that Landry’s natural inclination toward giving receded and gladly took second place.

  As Jade lowered her head between Landry’s legs to give her the hero’s welcome she’d promised, unwanted thoughts intruded. Landry struggled to push them away and stay in the moment.

  Jade raised her head. “Baby, where’d you go?”

  Shit. “Nowhere. I’m right here.”

  Jade shook her head and gently flicked at Landry’s clit. “Baby. You’ve gone soft. Where’s your head at?”

  Landry let out a defeated sigh and dropped her head back onto the pillow. “No fooling you, huh?” Jade moved back up beside her and traced her fingers over Landry’s upper body. Landry wished she could shut off her mind and concentrate only on the delectable feelings Jade invoked. Sex had always been an easy way to readjust her mind after missions. But she’d never come back unsuccessful, like now.

  “Did something go wrong with the mission?”

  Landry smiled. This is new. Jade was perfectly positioned to be a sounding board for Landry’s experiences on missions, but Landry wasn’t sure Jade would want to hear the part where her own life had been threatened. Or how she’d react to Landry wondering if her ability as an extractor had been catastrophically compromised by her growing feelings for Jade. “Everything went to hell in a turbo-powered handbasket.” Jade laughed gently and continued to caress Landry’s skin. Her touch was curiously comforting, and though Landry knew it was ridiculous, it began to soothe her toward a calm she couldn’t possibly feel.

  “That bad? Talk to me, Landry.”

  Landry didn’t respond for a moment while she contemplated how to summarize the sequence of events that had led to her returning without either her target or her team. “Delaney went rogue. She wants to take over Pulsus and run her own missions. She hired some local thugs, tried to convince me to join her, and when I wouldn’t…”

  Jade propped herself up on her elbow. “What happened?”

  The words were there. Landry could feel them pressing their hard edges against the back of her throat, unwilling to emerge and be heard. Saying it out loud for a second time gave it even more credence, gave the betrayal a home in which to permanently reside. “She was prepared to force me to give up the PRU, but someone helped me escape, and I came home alone. No Delaney. No team. No mission completed.” The debrief had been bad enough, but admitting these things to Jade somehow made Landry feel like even more of a failure. “I don’t deserve any sort of hero’s welcome, Jade. I fucked everything up.”

  She let Jade pull her into her arms and nestled her head against Jade’s steady heartbeat.

  “I don’t see how any of that is your fault, baby. Even you can’t control Delaney.”

  “I knew Delaney was having problems, and I was stupid enough to think I could help her. If I told my mom, she could’ve had Delaney signed off-duty, and none of this would’ve happened.”

  Jade kissed the top of Landry’s head and stroked her cheek lightly. “You can’t beat yourself up thinking you could’ve stopped this. Are you going back to complete the mission?”

  Landry shrugged. “That’s what makes this even worse. I don’t know. The board will make the decision about how they want to handle it. Nothing has changed at Pulsus, so whatever Delaney tried to do after I left her in 2055, it didn’t pan out. I have to find out what happened, but that’s research for tomorrow. I think the board has three options.” Landry moved even closer to Jade and wrapped her arms around Jade’s waist. She felt both absolutely vulnerable and completely safe. “They send a team back to rescue Muniz and bring Delaney and Simson with them; they rescue Muniz and…eliminate them; or they abandon the whole thing. Nothing like this has ever happened before, and I don’t know if they have contingency plans.”

  “Do you want to go back whatever they decide to do?”

  “I have to. I feel responsible, and I want to believe Delaney isn’t totally lost.”

  “What if the orders are to kill them?”

  Landry untangled herself and sat up to face the wall, unable to look at Jade. It was a fair question, and Landry knew Jade was only trying to help, but it still angered her. What did Jade expect her to say? That she wouldn’t hesitate to kill her best friend? Landry tempered herself. Jade was a civilian and didn’t comprehend the dynamic of soldier relationships; Landry and Delaney were practically family. Jade was new to all of this and was trying her best. Reacting badly to her genuine desire to help wouldn’t aid Landry’s dilemma. Jade’s hand warmed her shoulder, and she relaxed back into her arms. “I have to hope they won’t go for that option.” Serious fatigue set in, and Landry’s eyes closed as Jade enveloped her tightly. She tried to stave it off and blinked her eyes open wide. One more thing. “Have you been okay while I’ve been gone?”

  “In what way, baby?”

  “Have you seen anyone different hanging around your games or the restaurant when you’ve been with the girls?” Landry wasn’t sure how direct to be about the subject of a potential stalker-cum-kidnapper.

  Jade shuffled farther down the bed and used her middle finger to tilt Landry’s head up by her chin. She looked distinctly suspicious.

  “Out with it,” she said.

  Simple and straight to the point. “When Delaney was trying to get me to reveal the location of the equipment she needed to jump home, she intimated one of her colleagues, a big guy called Kondo, might’ve…taken you hostage.”

  “Intimated or said outright?”

  Landry shifted her position, but Jade wouldn’t allow her to break eye contact. “She told me he had you.”

  Jade shrugged. “But clearly he doesn’t, so why are you still concerned?”

  “He went missing a few days after we jumped back for the mission. I think that’s because Delaney faded, so he knew something had gone wrong. I just wanted to be sure, baby.” Landry squeezed away the visceral image of Jade in Kondo’s hands, just as Simson had described. “Have you seen anyone unusual hanging around?”

  Jade shook her head and ran her finger over Landry’s bottom lip. “No. Everything’s been fine. I’ve even had Elena checking in on me to make sure I was okay.”

  Landry was relieved there’d been no sign of Kondo. It made sense that he’d disappear once he realized Delaney was out of the picture. And she wanted to believe that Delaney had never given any of Jade’s details to Kondo in the first place. It was an anorexic sliver of hope she was clinging to, but Landry wasn’t prepared to give up on Delaney, not yet. Not unless she was absolutely convinced the Delaney she knew and loved was gone. “Still, I’m left wondering if this is a bigger problem.” This wasn’t something she wanted to discuss with her mom. She wasn’t sure if it was something she should be talking about to Jade, but it felt like she should. If they were going to stay together, whatever Landry did affected her too.

  Jade kissed her softly. “Meaning?”

  “I nearly lost it when I thought it was possible that Kondo had kidnapped you, even though I was sure it couldn’t be possible at the same time. Does that make any sense? Because it sure doesn’t to me.”

  Jade seemed to ponder for a moment. She ran her hand through Landry’s hair, down her neck, and sto
pped at her chest. Landry could feel her heart beating against the light pressure. Do I have to give this up?

  “You’re worried I’m your weakness. When you’ve been on missions before, you’ve had no one to worry about but yourself. That’s been easy, because you had little regard for life. You were pretty much untouchable. Having me in your life changes that.”

  “You’re pretty smart for a baller.” Landry traced small circles on Jade’s hip.

  “I studied hard while I was on my sports scholarship, baby. I know I won’t be a hot baller forever.”

  Landry smiled and kissed her. “I wouldn’t be so sure. You got any more, or is that it?”

  “I can’t claim full credit. It’s something I’ve been talking over with Elena.”

  Landry raised her eyebrow. Jade had managed to establish quick and easy relationships with the girls and her mom, and Landry seemed to be their favorite conversation topic. How am I supposed to feel about that? “Really?” She tried to control the irritation in her voice.

  Jade stroked down her arm and entwined their fingers. “Don’t be angry, Landry. I want to understand what you have to go through so I can support you fully when you come home. Your mom isn’t scaremongering by telling me what’s happened to you on some of your previous missions. I asked her, because I want to be in this with my eyes wide open. You’ve laid yourself bare for pretty much the first time ever, and I want to be deserving of that. But I can’t do any of it unless I have the full picture.”

  Landry sighed and relaxed a little. Everything Jade said made perfect sense. She knew relationships didn’t exist in a vacuum, and this was what she wanted, what she needed away from Pulsus. Landry hadn’t expected to mix the two worlds, but being able to did give her a sense of freedom. What she didn’t know was if it was realistic to maintain this kind of relationship and stay as an active extractor. “What if I can’t have you and my job?”

  Jade smiled, but Landry saw a hint of sadness in her eyes.